What’s next? Part 4
We have talked about many of the gifts so far, are any of you starting to practice them yet?
Can someone share his or her experience?
Today I’m going to talk about prophecy, speaking in tongues, prayer language, and interpretation of tongues but I need to start with two other gifts that many of you may have and may use daily but don’t realize they can be amplified as you surrender them to the Holy Spirit.
1 Corinthians 12:27,28
Now you are the body of Christ, and members individually. 28 And God has appointed these in the church: first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, after that miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, administrations, varieties of tongues.
Helps and Administration, these are two very practical and vital gifts of the Spirit that the church literally cannot survive without them
Helps
The spiritual gift of helping, service, or ministering, covers a wide range of activities in its application.
The word Antilepsis is translated “helping” and is found in 1 Corinthians 12:28. It’s meaning: to help or aid in love within the community.
The Holy Spirit endows some believers with this gift to fill the many gaps of ministry and meet the needs of the church as it fulfills the Great Commission.
Everything about this gift is practical as Bill Wilson our friend from New York says wondering about your call? The need IS the call!
While it starts as a practical gift, empowered by the Holy Spirit it is never a drudgery mostly a joy, and leaves you with a feeling of accomplishment because it is not about any pat on the back from a person but about knowing the Holy Spirit is empowering you for something that He desires to have accomplished. This gift fills in the gaps that are so needful for the Kingdom and the Gospel to be advanced and the church to touch the most amount of lives
We see people with this gift in passages like Acts 6:1-7, 1 Corinthians 16:15-16, and many others.
Administration – 1 Cor. 12:28; Acts 6:2-3
This is a unique term that refers to a shipmaster or captain. The literal meaning is “to steer,” or “to rule or govern.”
With this gift the Holy Spirit enables certain Christians to organize, direct, and implement plans to lead others in the various ministries of the Church.
This gift is closely related to the gift of Leadership, but is more goal or task oriented and is also more concerned with details and organization
Again this gift is very practical some shine in this gift all of the time and if they really shine it is because the Holy Spirit is empowering them in their natural ability to go to a supernatural level able to anticipate needs and solves problems well before they arrive.
This gift can tie in with the practical side of the prophetic understanding what the needs are and how to organize the solution before a problem happens
Which brings us to prophecy
Prophecy
The spiritual gift of prophecy is an extraordinary and unique gift. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 14:1 to “Pursue love, and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts, especially that you may prophesy.”
This gift is a blessing to the church and should not be quenched or despised (1 Thessalonians 5:20). Those who have the gift of prophecy differ from the Old Testament Prophets who spoke the authoritative Word of God directly. Their words were recorded as Scripture as they proclaimed, “Thus says The Lord,” whereas the messages from those with the spiritual gift of prophecy must be tested which means they can be wrong (1 Corinthians 14:29-33; 1 Thessalonians 5:20-21; 1 John 4:1-3).
These messages can take the form of exhortation, correction, disclosure of secret sins, prediction of future events, comfort, inspiration, or other revelations given to equip and edify the body of Christ
But he who prophesies speaks edification and exhortation and comfort to men. 4 He who speaks in a tongue edifies himself, but he who prophesies edifies the church
But if all prophesy, and an unbeliever or an uninformed person comes in, he is convinced by all, he is convicted by all. 25 And thus the secrets of his heart are revealed; and so, falling down on his face, he will worship God and report that God is truly among you
Practically speaking here is a way you can begin to flow in this gift. Being that it is, by Paul’s definition, an edification, exhortation, and comfort, you can begin encouraging people, helping them to see the best in themselves, asking the Lord to show you ways to encourage others and help to build them up
You see God sees the best in people, (1 Corinthians 13) He encourages them to be better, do better and as we do that, we begin to understand the Father’s heart for people, we begin to see them through His eyes and the Holy Spirit begins to work through us to enhance what we are seeing through God’s eyes
As we learn to see through the Lord’s eyes, we learn to hear His voice more clearly and are able to speak to people more of what is on His heart developing the prophetic gift within us
Share prophetic word about what will happen if we begin doing these things
Tongues, interpretation of tongues, praying in the Spirit
I don’t know of any way to practically start speaking in tongues or interpreting tongues
I know some will try to help others to receive their prayer language by saying repeat after me, or things like that. Sometimes that helps sometimes it hinders. Learning to speak/pray in tongues for most of us is a battle of mind versus spirit. It just doesn’t make sense to our minds to allow our spirits to communicate directly to God.
Which brings us to a Praying in the Spirit
1 Corinthians 14:14 “For if I pray in tongues, my spirit is praying, but I don’t understand what I am saying”
“Pray in the Spirit at all times and on every occasion. Stay alert and be persistent in your prayers for all believers everywhere.” Ephesians 6:18
There is a key difference here between praying in the Spirit and functioning in tongues for the benefit of the body…it would be like having a personal word of knowledge or word of wisdom for someone and having a public word…if you are praying in tongues it should be quiet and focused as if praying in English but if you are going to make a proclamation in tongues it needs to be loud enough for all to hear but also must be interpreted
Likewise, the Spirit also helps in our weaknesses. For we do not know what we should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself makes intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered” Romans 8:26
Likewise, Jude (the half-brother of Jesus) encourages us to pray in the Spirit (Jesus’ brothers James and Jude were in the upper room when the Holy Spirit descended Acts 1:14)
“But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit” Jude 20
I have found praying in the Spirit to be critical to building me up so I can handle the daily-ness of life, which generally changes the environment and reveals areas that need work and areas that are being overcome
Please take the leap of faith…begin choosing to flow in a gift. If you have not yet been filled with the Holy Spirit I hope this has taken some of the fear or concern out of it for you and that you would be willing to come